


Just "One Small Tree"

by All_InProcess



Category: Kingsman (Movies)
Genre: Christmas, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Fluff, Domestic Fluff, First Christmas, Fluff, M/M, Mistletoe, Young Harry, Young Merlahad, all fluff all the time, have some christmas spirit fluff for your stocking, young Merlin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-24
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2019-02-19 10:41:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13122048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/All_InProcess/pseuds/All_InProcess
Summary: Spolier Alert: it wasn't just "one small tree".





	Just "One Small Tree"

**Author's Note:**

  * For [superfandomqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/superfandomqueen/gifts).



> Happy holidays! I love writing fluffy Merlahad and I hope I treated your prompt well! xox

If he was being honest with himself, Merlin wasn’t ever super excited about the holidays. He didn’t _dislike_ them by any means, but he also wasn’t filled to the brim with the Christmas Spirit either. His mother loved the holidays, though, so he would always help decorate the tree and the house and the cookies. He helped wrap presents and he wore the ugly sweaters to the parties because he knew it made her happy.

But he didn’t live with her any more. It was his first holiday living in a flat with Harry and he was beginning to look forward to a relatively quiet Christmas. Harry had mentioned getting a small tree for their living room so that they would have _something_ to designate the holiday and that was something he couldn’t argue with. It seemed like things were going to be quiet for once and that suited Merlin’s needs just fine.

He balanced the bag of groceries on his knee as he reached into his pocket for the key to the flat. By some miracle he didn’t drop anything and was able to bump the door open with his hip. He was halfway to complaining about the loud Christmas music coming from their neighbor’s flat when he realized that the music was coming from his own living room. He sighed as he gently kicked the door shut behind him.

“Harry?” he walked to the kitchen, stepping over the boxes of decorations that were on the floor, “Harry where the hell did all this come from?”

Harry came striding out of the bedroom, with his Santa hat on, and leaned on the counter next to where Merlin had just set the bag of groceries, “You called?”

He sighed as he began setting things onto the counter, “Where did you get all the decorations? I thought you just wanted one small tree.”

“All _you_ wanted was one small tree. _I’m_ not a Scrooge so I did a little more.”

Merlin stared at him over the rims of his glasses, “I take it there’s no use in trying to talk you out this at this point then?”

“Name one time you’ve ever talked me out of anything.”

He took a deep breath and looked at the ceiling, “Alright. How much is left to do?”

He blushed, “Almost all of it.”

“ _Harry_ —”

“In _my_ defense, it took me a _very_ long time to find this hat _and_ I had to find some good Christmas music.”

“You’re getting this done on your own, you know that?”

Harry laughed and shook his head. He spun around and lifted himself up so that he was sitting on the counter while he watched Merlin put away all their groceries. Harry hated grocery shopping with a passion. He never knew what to buy in order to plan ahead, so he gave Merlin his three requests for the week and trusted him to do the rest of the legwork. It seemed to be working so far.

When Merlin stepped away to put milk in the fridge, Harry peaked into the bag, plucking a clementine out of its netting and starting to peel it. Merlin turned around and saw him; he shook his head but didn’t say anything as he finished packing things away.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Harry said as he popped another slice into his mouth, “But if you want me to do this all on my own, and I will, those boxes are going to be scattered around the flat for a very long time. And something tells me that that’s going to bother you more than the actual decorations.”

There were a lot of perks to dating and living with your best friend. They know what movies and snacks you like, they know how to cheer you up depending on what’s making you upset in the first place, and they know how to tell when you’re uncomfortable in a situation without having to say anything. Merlin loved everything about being with Harry. They fit like a glove. Unfortunately, through years of accumulating knowledge, Harry had also figured out _exactly_ what he had to do and say in order to get his way. Both of them were stubborn, but Merlin would almost always fold when it came to Harry. He had one soft spot and it was for his dork with crooked glasses that he refused to fix and unruly hair that he never did anything with.

So he caved. Again.

Within the hour Harry had wrestled Merlin into a Santa hat of his own. Harry made them some spiked eggnog and after a while it almost seemed as though Merlin was enjoying himself. Harry knew that there was Christmas spirit deep down in there somewhere, he just had to fill the apartment with it first.

“What on _Earth_ are you doing?” Merlin came back into the living room with another glass. He skipped the eggnog this time and just poured himself some rum.

“Decorating the tree?”

He shook his head, “No, no, no.”

“You didn’t even want to do _any_ of this,” Harry gestured to their living room, which was now looking rather festive. They put lights around the doorframes to each room and even put some Santa and reindeer decorations on the emptier shelves of their entertainment center, “So I don’t think you get to tell me I’m doing it wrong.”

“You have to put the lights on first, Harry. Everyone knows that.”

Harry sighed, setting the ornament back down in the box, “Fine then, have it your way,” he reached down, pulling out the small white Christmas lights and tossing them without much of a warning.

“Plug them in for me?”

“Why?”

“To see if they work? _And_ if you don’t have them lit up how are you supposed to know if they’re spaced the right way?”

Harry smiled. Merlin had a reason and a sarcastic remark for everything but Harry wouldn’t have had it any other way even if he could. “I love you.”

Merlin looked back, a smirk crossing his face as he plugged in the long strand of lights himself, “I love you too.”

Harry sat back on the couch and watched as Merlin wound the lights around the tree a few times, took a couple steps back, shifted the lights around, and went right back in to repeat the process a few more times over. Harry would have said it was excessive, but by the time he was done stringing them up the tree already looked beautiful. Harry wondered if it needed ornaments at all.

“Your mother taught you well, I see.”

He laughed, “Aye, she passed on a thing or two before I moved out.”

“She’s alright with you not being around to decorate this year?”

Merlin smiled, “She doesn’t want to say it, but she _is_ looking forward to making my father help her with it.”

The two of them set about putting ornaments on the tree. Harry brought a lot of his from home, but he’d also gone out and picked some up that we just for the two of them, to celebrate their first holiday living together. Harry had grown up in a house where the ornaments all had sentimental value—it wasn’t about the tree looking like it came out of a magazine as much as it was about remembering all of the fun times they’d all had during previous holidays and the story behind each ornament and things like that. He knew things in Merlin’s house were a little bit different, but he also figured that Merlin wouldn’t be distraught over there not being cohesive sets of ornaments anymore. 

Harry had at least kept true to his word about getting a small tree. They didn’t have overly high ceilings in their flat anyway so there was only so much he could do. The tree was starting to fill up quickly and rather nicely, if they did say so themselves. Once they were nearing the finish, Harry reached into a bag and pulled out four different boxes that each had a brand-new ornament in them and he set them on the table.

“Pick one!” his smile stretched from ear to ear.

“Pick _one_?”

“Yea! We each pick one _now_ , and then we get to open the other two on Christmas.”

Merlin smiled as he stepped forward to get a good look at the boxes, but they were all wrapped identically and were the same size so for all he knew Harry had gotten four of the same ornament. Which wouldn’t have been completely out of character.

He picked the second one in from the right, holding it close to his chest while he waited for Harry to choose his. Once he did, they both opened them at the same time. Merlin laughed as he lifted his out of the box. It was a cat, white with bright blue eyes like the one he’d had growing up, clinging to the bulb of the ornament with a very confused look on its face. He looked over at Harry to see what his was, smiling as Harry showed it to him. It was a little fire place mantle with two stockings hanging from it, each one with one of their names on it, and the mantle said, _“Our First Christmas”_.

“Harry, these are amazing,” he stepped forward and pulled him into a kiss, “Thank you.”

“Happy Early Christmas!” he smiled for a moment before placing the other two boxes underneath the tree.

They took a few moments to strategically place them but once they were done, Harry stepped back so that he could get a better look at it from the doorway to the kitchen. His whole heart warmed up at the sight of it. He and Merlin worked hard to be able to have this for themselves and it paid off. The whole place looked perfect. He motioned for Merlin to come and stand next to him to get a better look at their living room.

Merlin stood next to him, smiling as he wrapped his arm around Harry’s waist. “We did alright.”

Harry leaned his head on Merlin’s shoulder, “I think so,” he paused, smiling to himself, “Merlin, do one last thing for me?”

“Mm?”

“Look up.”

“Look—” he stopped short and smiled, “We’re standing underneath a mistletoe.”

Harry feigned surprise, gasping louder than necessary, “Are we? I had no idea.”

Merlin laughed, shaking his head, “I love you.”

“I love you t—” but before he could finish the sentence, Merlin wrapped his arm around Harry’s waist and dipped him back as he kissed him. It was their first mistletoe kiss and Merlin wasn’t going to let it be a mundane occasion. He felt Harry’s lips forming into a smile as his hands found their way to Harry’s mess of hair.

Harry was fighting the urge to laugh as Merlin dipped him. It wasn’t something that happened often but it always felt intimate when it happened. It was hard t be too serious, though, when he could feel the pom-pom from the man’s Santa hat brushing against his cheek. He let himself go almost deadweight in Merlin’s arms, partially because he trusted him and partially because he wouldn’t be upset if it brought them both down to the floor.

Merlin finally let him stand upright again but kept him pulled tight. He placed a kiss on Harry’s forehead—the height-gap between them wasn’t excessive but it was enough. Harry felt a flood of warmth go through his entire body as he wrapped his arms around Merlin’s waist. They stood there in the doorway like that for a long while, with their Santa hats on and the Christmas music still going in the background. If there was a way either of them were picturing spending their first holiday moved in together, this was it.

“I’m glad I get to spend my holidays with you,” Harry said without looking up at Merlin.

His voice was softer than it had been in a long time, “Me too.”


End file.
